One Czech or Slovak family can appear in different records under half a dozen spellings, and all of them can be right. The causes are the diacritics that other languages drop, the phonetic respelling by immigrants, the Hungarian and German forms used by officials and the gendered endings. This guide explains each cause and gives a practical method to search for every variant. We checked these details in October 2026, and laws, statistics and tools change, so confirm them before you rely on them.
Diacritics
The written Czech language uses diacritical marks above certain letters, and when names were recorded abroad the marks were usually dropped, so that Růžička became Ruzicka, Čermák became Cermak and Dvořák became Dvorak, according to a Czech-American genealogy tool. Slovak uses its own marks as well. In practice, a name with diacritics in a register may appear without them in a US census, and the reverse is true of indexes that add them.
Phonetic respelling
The same genealogy tool lists the ways immigrants changed spellings so that the pronunciation stayed the same or similar to the Czech original: SCH or SH for Š, CH or CZ for Č, W or F for V, C for K, E for I and OO for U. Examples are Šebesta becoming Schebesta, Vašíček becoming Vashichek and Vomáčka becoming Womacka. The Family Tree Magazine adds that Czech and Slovak letters not in the English alphabet, and their pronunciations, can trip up English speakers, and that you should look up variants by country.
Hungarian and German forms
- Hungarian. In the late nineteenth century some Slovak surnames were rewritten in Hungarian forms, such as Horváth for Horvát and Kováts for Kováč, and after 1918 Slovak spellings were restored. See our guide to Hungarian-speaking Slovak ancestry.
- German. German forms were used in the Austrian lands, and some Czech surnames derive from German.
- First names. A given name can change language with the record. Family Tree Magazine’s example is a woman who might appear as Elizabeth on a naturalization application, Alžbeta in Slovak parish registers and Erzsébet in Hungarian census returns.
Gender, number and case
Genealogy Indexer advises that when you search for a Czech or Slovak surname you should try all forms, including masculine and feminine, singular and plural. Its search for Novak returns Novakova, Novakovi and Novakovy, but a search for Novakova does not return Novak, and a search for a surname plus a given name must be varied by hand. You can combine variants in one search with the | symbol, as in Novak|Novakova. See our guide to women’s surnames and our guide to endings.
Soundex and sound-alike searches
Many indexes use the Russell Soundex system to find variant surname spellings, according to Family Tree Magazine, which recommends that, if a site gives the option, you try alternative schemes such as Daitch-Mokotoff, designed to handle Eastern European surnames better. A sound-alike search helps with transcription errors as well as with spelling changes.
Translations are less common than you might think
An older article on the Americanization of Czech surnames gave examples of names translated into English, such as Tesař and Truhlář into Carpenter. A modern Czech-American genealogy tool points out that literal translations, such as Novák becoming Newman or Svoboda becoming Freeman, are rarely used, and that most names only change spelling for easier pronunciation. Check both possibilities, but start with spelling changes. See our guide to surnames changed in America.
A search routine
- Write the name with its diacritics as it appears in the register.
- List the stripped version, the phonetic versions and the Hungarian or German forms.
- Add the feminine and plural forms.
- Search with sound-alike options and wildcards where a site allows it.
- Search the first names in each language, for example Alžběta, Alžbeta and Erzsébet.
- Compare the results with parents and siblings before you decide that two people are the same.
- Record every spelling with its source.
Keeping your tree consistent
- Use the Czech or Slovak form with diacritics as the main name where a register gives it.
- Add the American spelling and other variants as alternate names.
- Note the source of each form so you can explain differences to an archive.
- Do not merge two people because the names look alike, and do not split one because the spellings differ.
Illustrative composite (not a real family): A reader finds his great-grandfather as Schebesta in a US record and Šebesta in a Moravian baptism. The SCH for Š substitution explains the difference, and the baptism’s parents’ names match the names in the US family. He records Šebesta as the main name and Schebesta as an alternate.
Variants of given names
Family Tree Magazine recommends looking up surnames and given names on Behind the Name for variants by country, and searching the web for the name together with words such as Czech or Slovak nicknames or diminutives. Many Czech given names have English equivalents, and a few have several, so list the forms you might meet before you search.
A caution about indexes
Indexes are made by people and software that may have misread both the handwriting and the diacritics. A Czech name with a háček may appear in an index without it, and the same name in old script may appear with a different letter. Read the original entry whenever you can, and treat the index as a pointer.
Common mistakes
- Searching only with diacritics. Many indexes and US records drop them.
- Searching only without them. Registers and Czech databases use them.
- Forgetting the feminine form. Women appear under -ová.
- Assuming a name was translated. Spelling change is more common.
- Merging on similarity alone. Confirm with dates and parents.
Continue with our guide to reading Latin, German and Hungarian records and our complete guide to surname origins, and browse Surnames & Name Origins. Sources include a Czech-American genealogy tool on changed names, Genealogy Indexer’s note on Czech and Slovak surnames, Family Tree Magazine on Czech and Slovak names and Family Tree Magazine on overcoming Eastern European name obstacles.
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